Director
rlake@u.washington.edu
CV: 
PDF icon Robin Lake
Research: 
Special Education,
Charter Schools and Public School Choice,
Charter Management Organizations,
Focus on Washington State,
Innovation and Technology,
Washington Education Innovation Forum

Twitter: @RbnLake

Amazon Author Page: Robin Lake, Author

Robin Lake is director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) a non-partisan research and policy analysis organization developing transformative, evidence-based solutions for K–12 public education. Her research focuses on U.S. public school system reforms, including public school choice and charter schools; innovation and scale; portfolio management; and effective state and local public oversight practices.
 
Lake has authored numerous studies and provided expert testimony and technical assistance on charter schools, district-charter collaborations, and urban school reform. She is the editor of Unique Schools Serving Unique Students: Charter Schools and Children with Special Needs and editor of Hopes, Fears, & Reality: A Balanced Look at American Charter Schools. She co-authored, with Paul Hill, Charter Schools and Accountability in Public Education. She has provided invited testimonies to the U.S. House of Representatives Education and Labor Committee as well as various state legislatures.
 
She presents regularly at conferences and summits around the United States, and has advised on charter school implementation in South Africa and the United Kingdom. Lake serves as a board member or advisor to various organizations, including the Journal of School Choice, the National Center on Special Education in Charter Schools, the National Association of Charter School Authorizers, and Education Next. She was named to the summer 2016 class of the Pahara-Aspen Education Fellows Program, designed to support exceptional leaders reimagining U.S. public schools. 
 
Lake holds a BA in International Studies and an MPA in Education and Urban Policy from the University of Washington. She currently serves as Affiliate Faculty, School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, at the University of Washington Bothell.

11/2018
To Serve Every Student Well, Design for the Tails, Not the Mean

This essay explores how an education system built to meet the needs of “square pegs” could benefit all students.

11/2018
Rethinking the Traditional High School-College-Career Continuum

This essay explores the systemic changes needed to ensure student access to meaningful pathways to college prep and career training.

02/2018
Passing Notes: Learning from Efforts to Share Instructional Practices Across District-Charter Lines

This report examines recent efforts of districts and charter schools to share key instructional practices and offers recommendations for education leaders to move forward.

01/2018
The Slowdown in Bay Area Charter School Growth: Causes and Solutions

This report examines why charter school growth in the San Francisco Bay Area has slowed dramatically and offers solutions for cities nationwide to encourage the development of new high-quality schools.

11/2017
Stepping Up: How Are American Cities Delivering on the Promise of Public School Choice?

This analysis examines 18 cities offering public school choice to determine whether 1) their education systems are continuously improving, 2) all their students have equitable access to high-quality schools, and 3) their strategies...

CRPE at "The Urban Education Future?" in New Orleans
Date: Jun 18 2015
Where: The Sheraton Hotel, New Orleans

CRPE's Robin Lake, Betheny Gross, and Paul Hill will be featured speakers at "The Urban Education Future?" - Lessons from New Orleans 10 Years after Hurricane Katrina conference, hosted by the Education

Robin Lake Presenting at National Charter Schools Conference
Date: Jul 1 2014
Where: Mandalay Bay, Mandalay Bay IJ, Las Vegas, NV

Robin Lake will be presenting in this session on the role of charter schools in overhauling school districts.

CRPE researchers at American Educational Research Association Meeting
Date: Apr 3 2014
Where: Philadelphia, PA

The AERA Annual Meeting is the largest gathering of scholars in the field of education research. It is a showcase for ground-breaking, innovative studies in a diverse array of areas—from early education through higher education, from digital learning to second language literacy.

Washington Education Innovation Forum Presents: Professor Ed Lazowska
Date: Jan 23 2014

At January’s Washington Education Innovation Forum, Professor Ed Lazowska discussed how Washington’s primary and secondary schools are doing little to give students skills related to the jobs that are being created in their backyard, potential consequences if we do not change course, and how we might best expose our youth to STEM skills that are increasingly shaping our region’s economy and identity.

Washington Education Innovation Forum Presents: Bringing blended learning models to Washington State
Date: Nov 14 2013
Where: UW Medicine at South Lake Union


Our next Washington Education Innovation Forum will feature Jen Davis Wickens, Chief Regional Officer for Summit Public Schools, and Sarah Satinover, Summit’s Director of Growth.

L.A. Unified needs a plan, not a scapegoat
Dec 18 2017

Robin Lake recommends that the district and charter schools work together to curb the financial impacts of enrollment decline in L.A.

New Report Urges Districts, Charters, and States to Work Together to Ensure School Quality in Times of Charter Growth and Declining Enrollment
Sep 20 2017

CRPE's new report identifies possible solutions to help districts adapt to the reality of enrollment decline.

The Voucher Fight Isn't Clear-Cut
Jun 12 2017

In this op-ed for U.S. News & World Report, Robin Lake explains how her views on vouchers have shifted.

How L.A. school reformers can turn election wins into change
Jun 1 2017

Robin Lake and Paul Hill urge the new L.A. school board to avoid repeating mistakes of the past in this Los Angeles Daily News commentary.

Denver Public Schools’ glaring conflict: both authorizing and operating schools
May 18 2017

Robin Lake is quoted in this Chalkbeat Colorado article on Denver Public Schools' role as both an authorizer and operator.

To Meet the Needs of Complex Learners, School Systems Must Think More Boldly
Nov 5 2018

Robin Lake urges cities to leverage community assets, technology, and networks to improve services and supports for students with special needs.

States don’t need to wait on a Congressional investigation to improve online charter school oversight
Oct 16 2018

Regulations of online schools are ripe for experimentation at the state and local levels, writes Robin Lake.

San Antonio ISD’s Innovations Offer National Lessons
Oct 4 2018

Superintendent Pedro Martinez and his team exemplify the problem-solving mentality of the portfolio strategy, writes Robin Lake.

What John McCain's Example Teaches Us about Character in Schools
Aug 29 2018

Robin Lake writes that our public education system must do more to instill the values of civic engagement.

Removing the Boundaries Between High School, College, and Career
Jul 27 2018

Twenty-five years ago, CRPE was founded on the idea of the school as the locus of change. Today we are reexamining our old assumptions in light of new technical possibilities, changes in the economy, and a recognition that even the most effective schools may need to develop new approaches to